By Hank Langhjelm
I thought it might be helpful to review how the OWCP, OSHA and the Injured
Worker Program works to save the Office of Personnel (USDOL) money and
injury statistics by redirecting injuries to a medical retirement in lieu of accepting
legitimate claims.
The following excerpt from a document I presented before the Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission (circa 2002), may be helpful.
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Displaced Injured Workers
To the best of our understanding, there are an alarming number of injuries being
realized through the submarine inactivation and recycle program at PSNS.
Apparently, the shipyard is being forced to absorb a great deal of its fiscal
operating budget through the need to accommodate scores of injured personnel.
Normally, a significant number of these injured personnel would be covered
through the Office of Worker’s Compensation Programs (OWCP), while being
treated and recovering from their injuries; however, it has become apparent that
the number of injuries and illnesses being realized at PSNS is so vast, that the
shipyard might not wish the actual statistical numbers to come to light.
The recent investigations and findings by the US Occupational Safety and Health
Administration (OSHA) have resulted in a number of changes that will hopefully
turn this trend around. As a result of the number of injured workers assuming
overhead light duty work, the shipyard was in a Catch-22 situation, and the fiscal
budget was to the best of our knowledge, being consumed at a rapid pace.
Apparently, many of the traditionally needed overhead positions were being
encroached upon, and doubled up upon due to injured workers on limited duty. It
is being understood that the shipyard, seeking a remedy to the budget crisis,
started separating as many injured workers from employment as possible,
preferably through medical retirement annuities, thereby not having to deal with
the statistics relating to injury numbers.
A worker does not have to be injured at work to obtain a medical retirement
annuity; however, it must be documented that a permanent physical condition
exists that prevents the individual from performing the duties of the position.
Although the Rehabilitation Act requires the employer to find suitable
accommodation, the employer is better off from a statistical standpoint to have an
injured individual to medically retire, rather than becoming an injury statistic
through an accepted claim with the Office of Worker’s Compensation Programs
(OWCP).
Unfortunately this breeds an incentive to push an injured worker into a medical
retirement annuity, regardless of whether or not a permanent disability existed.
This method employed against workers is common throughout the federal
government, more specifically with those that are in the older Civil Service
Retirement System (CSRS); whereby the government benefits from the reduced
annuity, especially when the injured employee is near the age and time of an
optional retirement status. The benefit is in the reduced annuity that is paid out v.
a full retirement annuity.
This situation has been part and parcel to the creation of the current Injured
Workers Program at PSNS, where a concentrated effort is waged against the
injured worker, either through the frustration of being placed in a reduced pay
position, or in a position that bears little reward or challenge. Admittedly, there
are only so many light duty jobs to go around, so the effort must be placed to
label an injury as permanent, and then push for the medical retirement, rather
than suffering an injury statistic through a claim with the OWCP.
A review of the section on VSIP (Voluntary Separation Incentive Pay) provides a
view of the push by the US Congress to get out of the CSRS (Civil Service
Retirement System) program by FY 2008. Unfortunately, that situation places an
even greater emphasis on the route through medical retirement.
A thorough review of the enormous number of workers that have lost their jobs,
been denied compensation by OWCP, and in many cases, forced to accept a low-
end medical retirement, would reveal a great deal of wrong doing.
This is but another type of attrition that fits well with the failure to apply the VSIP,
CARE and the PPP. For the 1998 SIP/VERA program, the timing of the reversal of
the decision on Torres v. OPM is more a matter of convenience.
To this day, the Injured Worker Program at PSNS, is systematically shoving these
personnel out the gate, with a total disregard of their rights to compensation,
treatment and a livelihood, many of these personnel are veterans.
Medical News & Exposé
epi
The Navy's Displaced Injured Workers:
Saving Money, Ruining Lives
Puget Sound Naval Shipyard
|
CARE: Civilian Assistance and
Re-Employment Program
PPP: Primary Placement
Program
SIP/VERA: Separation Incentive
Pay/Voluntary Early Retirement
Authority
BRAC: Defense Base Closure
and Realignment Commission
Editor's note: Whistleblower Henrik Langhjelm emailed the following essay to epi in the
course of a prolonged process of questioning and confirmation in Jan. and Feb. 2009.